The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Portulaca plant botanically known as Portulaca oleracea and hereinafter referred to by the cultivar name ‘Balrioapt’.
The new cultivar originated in a controlled breeding program in Cartago, Costa Rica during January 2002. The objective of the breeding program was the development of free flowering Portulaca cultivars with well-branched, and vigorous, spreading growth habit.
The new cultivar was the result of a self-pollination of the Portulaca oleracea breeding selection designated ‘Wild Fire Bronze’, not patented, characterized by its average size salmon bronze-colored flowers, and compact, trailing growth habit. The new cultivar was discovered and selected by the inventor as a single flowering plant within the progeny of the above stated self-pollination during June 2002 in a controlled environment at Cartago, Costa Rica.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar by terminal stem cuttings since June 2002 at Cartago, Costa Rica and West Chicago, Ill. has demonstrated that the new cultivar reproduces true to type with all characteristics, as herein described, firmly fixed and retained through successive generations of such asexual propagation.